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Selected Topics in Product Management

Accelerating the Effectiveness Of Your Product Management Organization

This is a series of program modules designed to focus specific aspects of the product management function within an organization.  

 

These modules may be offered as a follow-up to Implementing the Product Management Function or as standalone courses that address specific areas of interest or need.  The length of each may be tailored to be ½ to 2 days, depending on the desire of the organization and the depth/breadth of coverage required.  In addition, other specific topics may be extracted from the Improving Product Lifecycle Management material or designed to accommodate specific needs.

 

IMPROVING PRODUCT INCEPTION

 

As the first step in the Product Lifecycle, the Product Inception phase is highly strategic and provides considerable leverage in determining the eventual success of the products that result.  Topics include:

·         Managing the “Fuzzy Front End”

·         Methodologies for capturing and screening new ideas

·         Portfolio Management

·         Product/Service Definition

·         Developing Product Specifications

·         The importance of market segmentation

·         Methods for segmenting the market

·         Tools for understanding the customer

·         Identifying the real customer need

·         Creating a specification that properly guides the development process

·         Using (and avoiding misusing) the specification during development

·         Designing the Whole Product

 

REDUCING TIME TO MARKET

 

There is increasing pressure to bring product to market faster, driven by a combination of customer expectations, competition and faster lifecycles of external components and complementary products.  This course addresses techniques that can be employed to reduce the cycle time in getting a product market.  Topics include:

·         Practical approaches for short-cutting the predevelopment process (“fuzzy front end”)

·         Developing economic decision rules that guide tradeoffs

·         The importance of process queues in cycle time

·         Why additional resources can improve economics

·         The role of architecture in reducing time to market

·         Effectively using incremental innovation as a tool for reducing time and risk

·         Properly sequencing activities

·         The pitfalls of the staged gate process and how top overcome them

·         Managing risk and uncertainty

 

ORCHESTRATING THE PRODUCT LAUNCH

The product launch is the “coming out party” for the new product and, like any major event, careful planning and execution is required for success.  This course addresses the various internal and external aspects of the product launch, including:

·         Planning the launch

·         Elements of the launch

·         The internal and external launch

·         Organizational preparedness

·         Mobilizing the key participants

·         The Product Introduction Plan, including a checklist of launch activities

 

Product and Product Lifecycle Management
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